The free flashcard app conversation always comes back to Anki eventually, and for good reason. Anki is genuinely free, the desktop version is free, the Android app is free, and the community has spent fifteen years building shared decks for nearly every subject imaginable. If the only question is which flashcard app costs the least, Anki wins by a significant margin.
But free does not mean frictionless, and it is worth being honest about what Anki's free tier actually requires. The interface is dated in ways that matter for casual users. The settings require reading documentation before they make sense. The iOS app costs around $25, which is the one significant cost barrier in the Anki ecosystem. And while the desktop and Android versions are free, the experience across platforms is not seamless in the way that subscription apps are.
The alternatives that have emerged in recent years - Knowt, Mochi, and Gridually - are all free or have generous free tiers that did not exist when Anki was the only serious option. Knowt is a direct Quizlet alternative built specifically around free access. Mochi has a clean interface and a free tier that covers most use cases. Gridually is free for individual use and adds spatial grid review on top of standard card review. The free flashcard landscape is meaningfully better than it was three years ago.
Anki desktop is completely free. Anki for Android (AnkiDroid) is completely free and independently maintained. AnkiWeb sync for keeping your decks in sync across devices is free. The only paid component in the Anki ecosystem is AnkiMobile for iOS, which costs roughly $25 as a one-time purchase. That fee funds the entire project's development, so it is not gratuitous, but it is a real cost for iPhone users. The shared deck library at ankiweb.net is free and contains millions of cards across virtually every subject. If you are on Android or primarily use a desktop computer, Anki is entirely free. If you are on iPhone and want mobile review, you have a choice between paying $25 once or using an alternative free app.
Knowt launched specifically as a free Quizlet alternative and has built a significant student user base. It supports the same card-based review and study game formats that made Quizlet popular, without the paywall. Mochi uses a different card format with more support for markdown and formatted content, which makes it popular with technical learners who want to include code or mathematical notation. Gridually's free tier supports spatial grid review alongside standard card review, which is a genuinely different study mode rather than just a clone of existing apps. None of these has Anki's community deck library or algorithmic maturity, but all three have interfaces that are more approachable for new users than Anki's default experience.
If you want the best free flashcard tool without qualification, Anki is still the answer for Android and desktop users. For iPhone users who do not want to pay for AnkiMobile, Gridually and Knowt are both solid free alternatives with modern interfaces. The free flashcard market is competitive enough now that there is no reason to use a limited free tier of a paywalled app when fully free alternatives are this capable. Gridually's spatial encoding is based on memory research from the University of Chicago, University of Bonn, and Macquarie University.
Anki is completely free on desktop and Android with no premium tier at all. Gridually offers a free tier with spatial memory flashcards and no ads. Mochi has a free tier for Markdown-based cards. Knowt offers a free Quizlet-like experience. Each has trade-offs in features and ease of use.
Quizlet has a free tier but it is increasingly limited. Many features that were free - including some study modes and ad-free studying - now require Quizlet Plus at $7.99/month. The free tier includes ads and restricted functionality.
Often yes. Anki is free and arguably the most powerful flashcard app available. Gridually's free tier includes spatial memory, which is a genuine innovation in how flashcards work. The best free apps are not watered-down versions of paid products - they are full learning tools.